Speaker 1I kind of wanted to be like Jesus and just like go forth and build a church. I'm out of here. Like, I don't want to be the guy, you know? A lot of people write books to be the guy. I don't want to be the guy. I want to live my life. He's like, I want to be Jesus, but I don't want to be the guy.
Speaker 2Bill, on that note, welcome to the show. Thanks. I don't know if you know what you're getting into. So basically, we're a bit of a catfish show. So the show is called My First Million, and it's a very obnoxious name that I picked six years ago, but the show got popular, so we didn't change it since then. And so people come because they think it's all about making money and getting rich. And it kind of was at the beginning. And then as we got rich, we started to turn our attention, as one does, to living a rich life versus getting rich, which is the subject of your book. That is how I discovered you. And so we're going to talk, I want to talk a little bit about both the making of, as well as. The using of money. And so maybe we start with, can you just explain, how'd you make your money?
Speaker 1I made my money, the original pool of capital, I made my money trading commodities. I trade natural gas derivatives. Started out as like assistant peon, as a clerk on the New York Mercantile Exchange floor. When the natural gas futures contract started, I really wanted to get into that. I became an over-the-counter broker, made like moderate money as a broker, but really hated brokering. And then when deregulation hit, I started to make money as a broker. Hit 1995, they were recruiting a lot of people from New York to come run the derivatives desk in Houston, Texas. I moved to Houston, Texas, and that's when I started as a trader making real
Speaker 2money. Sam, when he says energy, he's an energy trader, commodities, derivatives, what does that mean to you, Sam? How much of that do you understand?
Speaker 3Yeah, not much, frankly. We create websites that people come and they either buy it or they don't buy it. And I'm like, I don't know if we buy something or we make money via ads. So when I hear that, I'm like, are you buying barrels of oil and selling it to someone else who needs it? I'm kind of an idiot when it comes to
Speaker 1that. Yeah, you're basically just betting on price go up, price go down, or vol go up, vol go down with spreads, et cetera.
Speaker 2How did you get good at knowing if the price would go up or go down when every other smart guy is also trying to figure out if the price is going to go up or down? How do you win that game?
Speaker 1Well, we're really not in competition with the other smart guys. We're kind of glorified because we don't want to trade. We get induced to trade based on what the market is doing versus what we perceive for fair value. And so that's kind of like what an insurance agent does, right? It's like, okay, this is the distribution of outcomes. Here's fair value. Here's my theoretical edge, right? I'm going to charge you X for this insurance product.
Speaker 3Can you give an even more dumbed down example? So like, for example, a company needs to acquire a bunch of oil. Are you the middleman who would go and acquire oil? Yeah, I'm the middleman. I'm the middleman. I'm the and you try to get a small profit.
Speaker 1Yeah, let's say the winter's coming and people are afraid price is going to go up. And generally, I was always short, right? Because people are always afraid price is going to go up in a winter for natural gas. And we'd be like, okay, we'll sell you futures contracts. They've locked in a hedge from it going up and I'm exposed to it going up. But, you know, by and large, prices generally went down. The winter risk premium usually bled out and the prices would go down. And most of the money I made was from being short natural gas in the winter time.
Speaker 3Being a trader like this, it's one of the few gigs when you can get pretty rich as an employee working for someone else. I think I read that you made close to a billion dollars in profit for the company that you were working for. Were you personally making any money?
Speaker 1Yeah. I mean, had I been smart or smarter about it, I would have made a lot more money by having a lot of my money invested in the fund. But we had this theory back in the day, which was absolutely wrong because I was younger when I look back, that it's okay to make a lot of money, but you have no money in a job and it's okay to have no job and money, but it's not okay to have no job and no money. And so we were like, okay, if I get blown up here trading, it didn't mean I don't want to have all my money parked in the fund as well. Now, what I didn't take into account is, is that I was very young and maximizing risk at that age is probably the way to go. And I should have been fully concentrated and just bet the farm because I was always going to be able to get another job. So yes, as a trader, most traders at, independent hedge funds, not necessarily the banks, et cetera, you eat what you kill. So you don't really get anything if you don't make money. And then you get a percentage of the money that you earn when you do well.
Speaker 3And you were saying, you said, well, I initially made this pool of capital by trading. Were you sort of broke and then you just had like a killer year or a killer deal and it just, you had a windfall or were you making it as you went?
Speaker 1I was, I was kind of climbing the earnings tree first as a broker. I was an OTC broker, which I hated. I was good at, right. But you're going to make six figures, you know, you can make more if you like start a firm and be part of a firm. But it's, I, the analogy I would use is somebody who buys and sells houses versus somebody who's a real estate agent. I hated being a real estate agent. I wanted to be a guy who bought and sold houses. Right. And so I wanted to be the trader. And so, you know, I was, well off as a broker and got rich as a trader.
Speaker 2Now we've had a couple of different types of investors on the podcast in the past. We've had like Howard Marks, Ray Dalio types. And I would say a lot of what they talk about, there's kind of three ways to win that I've picked up. So one is superior temperament. So, you know, the kind of Buffett model of, you know, be greedy when others are fearful, be fearful when others are greedy, people who can handle swings better than others. And that led to superior returns. The second one was like an informational A. They understood something about a technology or a market and where the puck was going. And they understood the implications of it better than others did. And then the third is just straight up arbitrage. You know, I'm buying an ETF and I realized that the underlying hundred stocks underneath it are not priced exactly in, you know, in sum to the ETF price. And I could just kind of with no risk, make a spread here and I'll do it until that arb disappears. Were you one of those three or were you a fourth way of making money?
Speaker 1I would say we were one in two. We weren't the arbitrage. We were one in two. So the idea is, is that, you know, the market is comprised of a lot of people who, who are, you know, some people punting around and just, just straight gambling people that need to hedge. And then people who really, really understand the market very well study every single aspect that drives supply and demand. Right. And then what may happen. And then we'll have a position based on that, irrespective of your superior knowledge, if you are not stoic about losses and can handle that, your prefrontal cortex will not work while your amygdala is going crazy. Right. Or you're thinking about, wow, I lost a bunch of money, or you're that type of person that needs five wins for every loss, because that doesn't exist in trading. And so no matter how, how bright you are you need to have that temperament, that stoic temperament, that ability to handle losses, and, or, or be robotic about trading. But your temperament
Speaker 3is a little bit different and I kind of find it more interesting. So like we've had, like you said, Howard Marks, let's say. Howard is sort of an academic. He's like part philosopher, part academic, same with Ray Dalio. Like they're, they're, they're sort of this, this very unique type of thinker. Your attitude from just reading about you, you appear far more Texas cowboy. Like when I read books about like H.L. Hunt, you know, one of the guys who like got oil going in Texas in the mid, you know, 1900s, it seems like you have that energy because it seems like you are way more risk on than some of these other guys that we've mentioned. Is that accurate?
Speaker 1To certain, it depends on the product you're pushing, right? Like our product is like a high vol product. And so like, I always say that like, hey, this is a fun to get rich, not stay rich. And get rich is concentration risk. And so like, it comes off as like, yeah, ha, but it's really a thought out thing, right? Like, you can invest in my fund, you can lose 100%, but my fund can also return 300, right? So like, it's really the expected outcome. And what, what are you trying to do here? Did you ever almost lose it all? Yes, a couple times.
Speaker 3Hey, this is one of those episodes. So I don't want to show you my notes. But just imagine this is full of notes, because the other pages are Sean, and I have been sitting here taking notes for this episode. And whenever that happens, what we decide to do is make life easier for you and put all of our notes into a document that you can just click here in the link below and download. It just makes your life a lot easier. So no need to take notes, just download what we did. And we made it pretty actionable, very easy to understand. So click the link below and get it. Now enjoy the rest of the episode with Bill. What were the what were the swings in numbers? Down
Speaker 150% to plus 250. On how much money
Speaker 2are we talking about?
Speaker 1100 and something million, 200 million, you know, so 100 million, to 250 million. Yeah, by you know, in a year, and then we go through the winter, we build it up, we chop wood, and we go there. And that's why like the you know, we say, I said the name of the game is the stay in the game. You know, we're in a market that provides edge to people that really study it and keep their wits about them. And so if you are able to not completely blow up and get knocked out of the game, you will eventually have outsized returns. It's the same thing with insurance, like right, like you're saying, like, oh, they're cowboys, these insurance insurance guys, wrote these insurance policies against hurricanes. And then two hurricanes came, and they have a terrible year, like some almost get wiped out, right? But then they keep writing insurance the next year, the insurance goes up and they just print money and print money. And so unless you're in the arbitrage game, you will have a bad, you will have a very bad year. Sean, this seems like your
Speaker 3style a little bit.
Speaker 2I do enjoy myself a little gamble. Now, let me ask you a question. You seem today like you're a pretty chill guy and you have all these hobbies and interests and friends and the kind of well rounded life. But everything I know about traders is that they, you know, I asked one guy, well, you know, were you kind of a maniac back in the day? He's like, dude, we were pissing in Coke bottles on the floor. You don't, you know, it was intense. Like the intensity of trading is crazy. You know, you wake up at certain times to check what's going on in Tokyo and blah, blah, blah. Yeah. Were you, did you have a decade of your life where you had to be a bit of a maniac or no?
Speaker 1Yeah. You become obsessed with the puzzle. And that obsession helps you to have informational knowledge edge or to think about things that could happen that other people are not thinking about and scoop up the money. And so I think that happens to all traders to whatever they're trading, right? Like, because it is a very, very difficult thing to do. It's complex. There's many variables moving around and you have capital at risk. So you're, you're always, whenever you have a position, you're always working. You're never off, right?
Speaker 2Knowing what you know now, would you have advised your younger self to go into that field? Or would you have said, Hey, just build, build, a company that's going to sell a product?
Speaker 1Knowing what I know, I would, I would have went into equities. It's just much bigger. And it's, you know, guys have $6 billion funds, $10 billion funds, right? With like, what I would consider okay, track records, you know what I mean? Or not that exciting track records. And you get positive drift on your side from the stock market.
Speaker 3Does the skill set translate? So equities, meaning you would, you would evaluate different companies and figure out which ones are great. Yeah, have a basket of stocks.
Speaker 1There's just so much more capital available for people to invest in equity. So equities, it's kind of like, you know, there was a period where there's nowhere else to go type of mentality, like we have to be allocated equities. And so, and, you know, the fees they charge in equities are quite amazing on these giant funds, right? Like you have a $6 billion fund charging one, one and a half. I'm like, what fund costs that much money to run? Like it doesn't, right? So like your, your, your, your, your, your maintenance becomes a profit center. And then your upside is just amazing, just in terms of the notional dollar amounts. And so in terms of like personal wealth, like how could I have been much richer? Would it went into equities? Do you do that now with your personal money? Yeah, I do. But I'm 57. I'm not here trying to have a party at 85. You know what I'm saying? Like my life is now, you know, like if I were younger, that makes sense. But like for me, I'm at the back quarter of my life. And so it doesn't make sense for me to be wasting my current years. To earn a bunch of capital for future years, given my age.
Speaker 2When you were coming up, did you have like a number in mind a goal? And then did you hit that number? Did you just simply like most people move the goalposts and say, No, no, that's not enough. Like, describe to me kind of your what your relationship was with the number?
Speaker 1Yeah, the number was I just wanted to be a millionaire before I was 30. It was kind of a thing. You know, I blew through it. But there was never like a cap number. Like, if I make x, I'm going to quit. I didn't really think it through at that time. About what it was like, I was young, I wanted girls in the rock star life and all the bullshit that comes along with it. So I didn't have like a really thoughtful process about, like, what do I want out of life? And what does that cost? Right? I just knew that I wanted a lifestyle. I wanted to be rich. I wanted to be able to get the girls, that type of thing. Right. And then everybody kind of parrots, like, I want to be a millionaire before x date, right? It's almost like a Miss America cookie cutter answer type thing that people starting out do. They're not really thinking about it. It wasn't until later in life that I really was thinking about, like, what does that mean? And what does the number mean? And is it even a number? Right? Is it really a date?
Speaker 2When you talk about later in life, is that like in the last five years? Or that was when you were 32?
Speaker 1It was probably in 30s started really starting cementing it as of like, the number doesn't matter. The age date matters, like your net worth peak is actually a date, not not a number. Just given the fact that your body is a decaying asset, and its ability to convert that money into fulfillment and useful experiences declines, net rate of decline starts approaching affinity as you get close to your deathbed. And so like more money means nothing at a certain point in your life. And so that's slow matters. There's more. And so that isn't when you're 20. That isn't when you're 30. So somewhere between 30 and 65, that slope starts to really pick up such that more money doesn't really mean anything
Speaker 3to you. What was that moment that changed that where you realized there's a different way to live? Like, did you read something? Did you experience something where you're like, where you got smacked in the face? And you're like, there's a better way. And this is where I'm going to carve out this new path.
Speaker 1Yeah, it wasn't like I, you know, I was on my horse on the road fell off it and got a vision. It was more like there were there many things I read a book called your money or your life, which kind of introduced the concept that the best definition of money is something you exchange hours of your life for. And then that kind of like set off a whole bunch of other thought processes about like, okay, I'm exchanging hours of my life for capital, what's that capital for? Like, what are my values? And then started thinking about that, like, okay, I'm giving up hours of my life to get hours of other people's life to do x. What are those? Things, right? And why, you know, that that that started coming along. And then, you know, really thinking about death. And when do certain things happen? Like, you want to get the girls, but it's not when you're 40. You should probably marry by then you know what I mean? Like you want to do all the rock star stuff, but it's not, you know what I mean? It's not a 55. Right? And so like, it's kind of like what experiences belong when and what is the arc of my life look like? How does money fit into that? How does health effect affect that? And so those thoughts, we're reinforced by different conversations, books I've read, etc, to come up with like that comprehensive way I thought about wealth, health and time, and how to allocate those resources throughout my life to get the maximum amount of fulfillment. And you know, I had to answer what is the purpose of life and the purpose of life is to be fulfilled according to your own values. And so then I was like, okay, what does that mean to me? And then how do these variables fit? You know, and so that was over a time period. It wasn't just like, oh, shit, here it is, I have this formula, you know, equals MC squared, or, you know, it kind of is like that.
Speaker 3It's sort of funny, like the reason Sean and I aren't particularly investors, but we'd like having these investors on, because it's sort of funny to see them take their Rain Man like abilities to like analyze numbers, but they use it towards like other parts of life. And that's where it starts getting interesting, because they're sort of like very rational, whereas most people do things just because that's how everyone else does it. And you start seeing hearing these like, fairly rational, somewhat controversial opinions on how to live life or handle risk or whatever. And that's where things are actually get really interesting, because they kind of break the mold. And that's what you're describing. And so it's pretty funny to hear you talk about like the balance sheet of life, just like a decaying asset. That's kind of interesting to me.
Speaker 1It's funny, because, you know, one of the things that had an impact on me that that was like, I was in an argument with a friend on a football team named Dwight Sistrunk at the University of Iowa. And we were talking about something, I don't know. And he was like, yeah, I don't want that. That's what you want. Like, I don't want to pick a fence in a White House or whatever and go get a job and work like that. I don't want that cookie. I want a different life. And I remember thinking like, well, what could he possibly want? Like, I was so inculcated with like the bullshit and the Chevy Chase movies and get married, have kids, get a nice car, climb the corporate ladder that I couldn't even see past that. Right. Like, and that conversation haunted me later on over years combined with other things to like think about, okay, different people have different values. Fulfillment means different things. What's a values agnostic way to look at these variables in order to have the most fulfilling life?
Speaker 2I want to read you an email I sent to my sister and my mom. That's from your book. It's an excerpt from your book that resonated so much that I hand typed it back out by hand. I like that. I was like, y'all aren't going to read this book, but I need you to read this. And so it says, death wakes people up and the closer it gets, the more awake we become. And when the end is near, we suddenly start thinking, what the hell am I doing? Why did I wait this long? And then you go on and you say, most people live their life like this. They build a well and start to pump water. As the well fills, they use a cup to scoop out a tiny amount of water. They take a sip and then they go back to pumping. Higher and higher goes the water. And at the end of their lives, after a lifetime of pumping, they're still thirsty. They spent their whole life pumping rather than drinking. And then you talk about a couple of the principles. One, timing matters. Some experiences can only be enjoyed at certain times. You can't water ski when you're 90. Number two, what to worry about. You can always make more money in the future, but you cannot make more time in the future. So it makes sense to not worry about squandering our money. Squandering our lives should be a much greater worry.
Speaker 1That's like the why you write this book. Why do you think about this? Is that I was very, very afraid of wasting my life. Very, very afraid. A lot of people, they're like, they get so caught up in the game of making money, whatever. And they're like, oh, I fear losing money. I fear losing all I built. And I fear losing my status, whatever. And I'm just like, that shit. I fear wasting my life. the money is just a tool to get how
Speaker 3do you how do you balance um career ambition ego and living where you're gonna die soon and and all that i mean that that's that's really hard
Speaker 1yeah i think if you really want to be successful and do something different and live live a like a non-standard life you really have to crush your ego constantly there are some high ego people that somehow make it or whatever uh in a narrow lane but then i tend to think they suffer the other balancing points and having a real fulfilling life can
Speaker 2you explain what you mean by crush your ego like what did what does that mean for
Speaker 1you when did you do that well most people who don't start a business or don't go chase an opportunity etc don't do it because of ego not because of the money risk they can handle the money risk they can handle losing that job and becoming a waiter or whatever but their ego cannot take the status drop they cannot take oh wow i'm now less than my friends on this poll of measuring money making i'm going to look like a fool doing this to other people and so yeah they'll argue with you and give you motivated reasoning that this is why they didn't do it because it was hard or it was you know this was difficult whatever and i always tell them like i don't give a f**k what the adjectives are i don't care if it's salty is it a shot at the life you wanted to live and why you know why didn't you take the risk and when you really break it down when you really talk to somebody you know it's ego they're just chicken shit and and you know like it's hard like if i don't know a person like i'm not gonna be like calling them chicken shit to your faces but my friends who get the straight dope i'm like you're just a f**king pussy you're just a straight pussy and they know it they know they are they don't they cannot take the ego risk they can't take the judgment of their own self-esteem and they can't take the judgment of themselves their parents their friends wider society that they went out tried this thing and failed and it's a reason why people root for you to you know quietly root for you to fail when you try something because you expose their their
Speaker 2own cowardice let's say you you point out to a friend you say look man i think you're just being i think you're just being scared i think you're just being a pussy about this whole thing is there more to it than just that's that's what it is get over it hey you need to just do it anyways they still don't do it i mean a lot of them don't do it for the few that
Speaker 1do what works what what works to get them out of that state i mean awareness is half the battle but there's a whole other half that has to be done right like it still has to turn into action right there's a lot of alcoholics that are aware they're alcoholics and they still drink right like the action plan still has to
Speaker 3happen right but let let's assume that you are a person who is not being soft and living the life that you like what percentage of the year are you actually not being soft like what does what does living to the standard actually look like because it's easy to say that but i'm sure you like you're a human you you you get soft like everyone else yeah so like so like how many times a month are you doing something where you're like shit i gave in i shouldn't be doing this i followed my ego or i said i i will i i committed to something that i shouldn't have committed to
Speaker 1whatever i mean it's it's a constant conversation i have to have with myself about a lot of things it could be in an interpersonal relationship on having an ego and not saying i'm sorry like i don't want to i don't want to look wrong you know i don't want i don't want to appear wrong i don't want to appear like i'm the person it could be like i don't want to look like an idiot i don't want to go get up and do this or i i i i'm being soft about this situation i you know i've had a lot of training and not giving a what other people think both in compliments and and derision and so it allows me the freedom to be me and try things that other people would be scared to do
Speaker 3how often do you get accused of being a jerk and you're like i'm sorry i don't want to look wrong like how do you how do you live this life but like you know being uh kind and and loving to
Speaker 1the people you care about it's very important to be kind i'm a big supporter of people like i want people to win give them my time and show up for them but my time is extremely valuable i don't know i probably my wife was like you're being an asshole it's probably like you know it's like if you a month ago or whatever it's usually when it's just like a argument and being forceful about being like you don't need to be right you need to be loved and like you know let it go type of thing that's a good line and so i i i think it comes across and i'm also very i'm like you know on the complete empath and an empath to a autist you know kind of over here like one shade in the like i i give people the straight dope and you know i don't pull punches i don't think i'll feel people get any value from me if i'm performing some sort of social niceties i think you should get like the straight dope from me so i think if you are not aware and value that type of feedback you might be like oh he's an asshole as opposed to wow you actually told me something that my closest friends won't tell me and are giving me the straight dope whether it's accurate or not that's up to you you can take it or leave it but i'm providing you a proper mirror like i'm the type of guy who will tell you like you got a booger hanging out of your nose and some people won't and so like but you got friends that are just like i'm not gonna say anything while you're sitting there talking with a booger out of your nose like i'm not gonna say anything while you're sitting there talking with a booger like so like it's just you know that's how i show up i don't want to embarrass you so i'll let you embarrass yourself yeah exactly like you exactly that type of thing and and for whatever reason you know it doesn't mean they're being an asshole whatever it's just that's their programming you know hey so a minute ago you
Speaker 2were talking about like you know you had a friend who was saying look i don't want that kind of cookie cutter life and you realized that you had been wanting this kind of cookie cutter life this uh this vision that had been set for you whether it's cultural osmosis
Speaker 1as i like to call it you know
Speaker 2yeah exactly um and and it sounded like you had to go redefine with a blank sheet of paper what do i care about what kind of life do i want you had you had to put some definition behind it something that that meant something to you and even if others wouldn't want that you really wanted it what what did you come up with well what is the
Speaker 1answer to that for you i i really you know it wasn't like i sat down and like i cracked through and sat down with the dalai lama and meditated but i i realized like hey what i wanted at the time i was going to go for it and then i realized that a lot of the things that i thought i wanted had just been great marketing either by society or the movies and i had been inculcated with it and so you know i realized like holy shit the foods i like the things i do were really just programming right i don't eat fried crickets because i didn't grow up in asia you know if i grew up in china i'd be like when can we get some fried crickets man and things are really good right to me it's repulsive but the only reason why it's repulsive is i didn't grow up in asia grow up eating fried crickets right and so almost all the things that i like were programming not innate right and so i i realized that it was going to take a lot and it's not that all programming is bad like some of them was like i like it copy paste repeat but a lot of the programming did not work for me it was that conflict of what i really wanted and it was going to take some thinking and discovery um to to actually come to what i what kind of life i wanted you know what these how do these conflict with my values or my values the right values yada yada yada and that was going to happen over time it wasn't something that was going to happen like right away i was going to release 20 something years of programming in a day right give us a couple of the bullet
Speaker 2points what did you what were some of the principles or tenets that that you did end up replacing that actually you do live by now or you do chase
Speaker 1now well there's a lot i mean how i react to people when they trespass against you i've show up with kindness like you're in jersey city right you're going to club somebody steps on your sneakers somebody might die right like that's a cultural programming what can you decide that you're going to do i'm not going to be punching people in the face because they stepped on my sneakers in a
Speaker 3crowded so you said okay so uh rule rule number one i'm not going to be reactive i'm gonna i'm not going to be a hot yeah like
Speaker 1how well i'm reactive but what are my response cries to certain stimulus right like there's everybody has certain stimulus like somebody dies somebody cheats you somebody does this somebody does x y and z this happens that happens and then you have responses right out of your toolkit and you know i started to look at out of all the infinite ways you can respond to a stimuli why was i choosing these ways right and the judgment was does it work or not work for my goals so there's no you know i mean like it wasn't like a a judgment in terms of like this is the right way there's wrong ways like does this work or not work for my goals what are my goals so there's a lot of thinking and going on there about everything like if you know you see certain things in the news or people like oh this bad thing happened and they did this and you're like okay why did they behave that way somebody insults you you what did you say how did you react you know and you know people write tons of books on this stuff like you know controlling yourself or whatever but ultimately is like you have lots of stimuli and lots of responses and which ones work for you and which ones don't and and the ones that work you know you rip them out and replace them with something else
Speaker 3that's been um you know people ask us we've done almost a thousand of these episodes people like what what are some of the commonalities of people who win and i always say well the first thing is like there's like for every rule that you read about in business like i can point to many examples of people who have broken that rules and are equally successful and success is defined as you know they are where they want to be but the other thing is that there's this like internal locus control amongst winners which is like basically i can only control me how i feel how i situation. It's all up to me. Those are probably one of the only two things that are true that we've notice a bunch of successful people, but that attitude that you just described is one of the common ones. Yeah.
Speaker 1Essentially, it's maximum accountability, right? It's just like you are ultimately accountable. Do you know, you're
Speaker 2a poker guy, you know, Daniel Negreanu? Yes. So Daniel came on the podcast and, you know, obviously I wanted to nerd out about poker, but we asked him one other question. We're like, what was, you know, an important turning point of your life? I thought he'd say some tournament win. And he was like, dude, I went to this self-help seminar. He went to choice. Yeah. I went before him. Oh, you were, okay. Maybe you were the guy who told him.
Speaker 1He was like five or six classes after me.
Speaker 2He was like someone I really respect had done it. And so, you know, I said, all right, fine, I'll go do it. And he talked about this maximum accountability principle, where you had to write a story of your life or something that went wrong in some way you were wronged or, you know, something that went wrong in your life. And then rewrite the story where instead of in the victim mindset, but in with a hundred percent ownership of your part of that whole thing. And he goes, it was the most freeing moment of my life. And I, and it really stood out to me. I think of a, I think a lot of people would benefit if they just rewrote one story in their life with, from the point of view of maximum accountability. Did you do that same exercise?
Speaker 1Yeah, I've done that and many more on, in terms of accountability and not, not being in a victim mindset. And it's, it's, it's a natural thing. I mean, we've taught it. It's in the culture. Your ego doesn't want it to be wrong. So, you know, getting the maximum accountability. Yeah. Aspect going is, is a constant practice, right? Like you never get to perfection. You just, you constantly have to practice that.
Speaker 3Can I ask about living this life with a family? Because you guys, you were talking about like the white picket fence and stuff. And what's funny is I never wanted any of that. Then I had kids and I actually had to like a retrain where I'm like, I actually do like being home at five and not going out at night. And I don't particularly love traveling that much. Cause I want to be with my family. Like I wanted a more of a, a boring life. And I actually think a lot of like young men in America probably need a little bit of where it's like, it's kind of nice to work 40 hours a week and also have a family that you're with all the time versus partying and going out. How do you live this pretty dope life when you have young kids? I think your kids are more grown now, but what were you doing when your kids were in school and trying to like live this life where you're trying to be fulfilled?
Speaker 1Yeah. And just trying to balance it. I mean, I have 11 months old now, my kids are 22 and 19 and they definitely want to come. Like I had a big party. My daughter's like, can I come? Can I come? I'm like, yeah, you can come, but you can't, you can't stay. I was like, look, you guys have six street and all the party. And I was like, why can't us adults hang out and get our swerve off? Like, why are you going to come? But she wants to hang out. She's like, dad, you're cool. I want to hang out now. It was before I was like, dad, you're so strange. Like, why are you so weird? Like, why do you do this? Like, why do people know you? And now we hang out and we have a good time. And you know, traveling, I take my kids traveling. We try and arrange the life. I like, listen, there's something very seductive about a bucolic life, um, that I want later, you know, I'm ultimately want to be a farmer. And, you know, I've thought about how do I get everybody into life that I want to live. And, you know, balance for me is like the pendulum. Like how do you manage the pendulum swings? Because your life is not perfectly balanced for each time period, right? It swings into I'm grinding really hard to I'm vacationing really hard. I'm partying really hard. I'm relaxing really hard. I'm, I'm, you know, I'm doing spiritual work. I'm doing spiritual work. I'm working really hard, right? It's a swing, right? It's never the pie is cut evenly each day or even each month, uh, or even each decade, right? Like this might be the decade of, you know, learning all this shit. And then I'm a doctor and then it's a decade of practicing. It's a matter of like getting buy-in and enrolling other people in the vision and making sure it works. You know, there's people who are, you know, military parents and their, their kids travel all over around with them and that's their life. And they make the best part of that, their life. There's some people that that's just who they are. They don't have an obligation to the United States government. They travel around with their kids and they want to live, you know, live somewhere. My wife and I were like, Hey, we want to live in Japan for a little bit. So we're going to pack up our little boy and go to Japan. It's really about just making it the best ride. There's infinite rides. I don't think one's necessarily better than the other. It's really just a preference and then designing the life that you want and, and, and, and trying it out. You know, I don't, you know, there's nothing wrong with people that just, like, Hey, I just want a nine to five. This is a job. I'm gonna join the rotary club, you know, get a nicer car, go on vacation two weeks a year and then die. Like there's nothing wrong with that. It's just not for me.
Speaker 2Hey, let's take a quick break. You know, that feeling when strategy is done, the brief is written, everyone's aligned and you realize someone still has to sit down and actually create all the content that someone is usually you and it's due tomorrow. Well, the breeze assistant from HubSpot can help. It works right inside HubSpot. You can draft a campaign copy, blog posts, emails, all in your brand voice, all using your actual customer data. So you don't create just content. You create content that converts. Check out HubSpot.com, the agentic customer platform for growing businesses. Can you explain this idea of time buckets, not bucket lists?
Speaker 1Yeah. The idea of like, a lot of people think life is like, Oh, I have a bucket list and, you know, like the movie, you know, a month before I'm going to die, I'm going to run around, do all these things. I'm going to be happy. Right. My life is complete. And the main thing is, is that each period of your life, like you don't have one day, you have many deaths, right? There was the college you that died. There was a single you that died. There was you with young kids that died, you know, first job, first startup, et cetera. Right. And, and, and they're largely in age brackets, right? Like for most people. And so each period in your life, certain experiences are optimal, depending on who you are in the arc of your life in that time period. And don't transfer well to the next time period, or they don't transfer at all. And so it's like, Hey, if your life, if a satisfaction, a satisfactory life for you was like, I want to go skiing in my life 500 times. Well, the distribution of those ski trips are probably going to come earlier. Right. And if it's skiing with friends, it's probably earlier, right? Cause they get married, they have life or whatever. And if you just kind of like, Oh, I have a bucket list ski 500 times. And those activities get shifted later into your life. Well, you've kind of it up, right? Like, cause you're really not going to get those 500 ski trips. Right. And so life is like Tetris. You kind of have to get the order right in order to get the high score and fulfillment. And so, but what that requires you having kind of a, a good understanding of what you want out of life and thinking about like, okay, what I want in life with respect to my kids and my family and my job and my career, my own leisure, my own hedonistic activities, my own altruist activities, et cetera. You're not going to know it all because life is discovery. Right. You don't know what you want. You discover what you want. Right. But having kind of like a time bucket of each period of your life, maybe three to five year brackets and say, okay, what experiences, what choices do I want to make in this period? When in this period, in this period. And when you do that, you'll go, Oh my gosh, I have this here and it should be here and this here, and it should be there. Right. And then you'll have a much more fulfilling life because you'll actually get to do both of them as opposed to up the order and not getting it at all. Do you do any type of annual planning? Yeah, we do. We do like kind of a period time bucketing period. Like this is what we want to do. Like we know while Kai is, you know, under five, we definitely want to go live in a different country, particularly Japan. And we're like, okay, how long is that going to be? Is it just going to be a summer? Is it going to be a year? Is it going to be two years? You know, we're actively discussing like how that fits, you know, what's going on. And then all the other things, you know, people have multifaceted, multivariate experiment running their lives, right? Like how do all these pieces fit in? And it's kind of fun doing that.
Speaker 3Do you sit down with your wife and you're like, okay, like, because we talked with Jesse Itzler, and I think Sean does this now where he like, do you do this, Sean? Were you like, like Jesse, where he like plans his like quarterly trips?
Speaker 2I carve out three days now a year, because it just seemed crazy to me that I wasn't spending 1% of my year just trying to think through how to spend the other 99%. And so now I spend three days and I, I try to get creative and think about what I want this year to look like and what would be the most exciting version of the year. And then I put stuff and I try to make it happen then.
Speaker 1Yeah, that's awesome. I mean, we sit down frequently, but our, our, our life and our travel schedule is so packed and there's so many, we're reacting to a lot of events, right? Like we're in the playing the game, like catching events, like, and trying to move them around. Can we go? But then the larger arc conversation, like where do we want to be and set up camp? What culture do we want to discover? You know what I mean? What activities those are ongoing.
Speaker 2But what part of your life are you most dissatisfied with right now? And I ask I think when people listen, it's cool to hear somebody who's got their shit together and inspires you, but also it's good to remember, like everybody's still a work in progress, right? Everybody's got some level of what's about, they're still trying to shift around, whether it's their health or their
Speaker 1relationships or whatever. I'd have to say health adherence right now. Like I got married four years ago or was it four years ago? And you know, I was 8% body fat, VO2 at the top 1%, yada, yada, yada. And now I'm probably like 16, 18% body fat. And VO2 is like barely at the mid for my age, which is not the way to be. And so I would say that's probably the most dissatisfaction. I got a lot of victim stories of like, you know, I get up twice a night because we have a small baby. I'm too tired to do the things, you know, just went to a pregnancy and just kind of ate like, you know, I was a prisoner on death row. Like, But that's just all bullshit. so like i'm just being lazy and not doing the thing so i've broken all the all the all the stay in top one percent health and i'm i'm you know down in the mids or below in certain areas that's not too bad though i mean and
Speaker 3it's also i think like i just had a kid too and and i'm i'm i was peak now i'm a little less than peak but it's like for some reason i in this phase i'm like i'll be a little less than peak i accept it i
Speaker 1i would say it's actually pretty horrible because you're using the u.s averages and the u.s averages have like a 40 obese rate so i actually think it's pretty pretty
Speaker 3bad no but i mean looking at you now looking at you now i think you said you're 57 i could be like you're you're probably decently
Speaker 1fit yeah i mean it depends on what you want out of life like uh you know my doctor has a thing called the centurion olympics and it's kind of like okay in the last decade of your life what actually happened to you in the last decade of your life what actually happened to you in the last decade of your life activities would you like to do and they have like i don't know 50 or whatever activities but you pick them and then things are like pick up a small child walk a hike have vigorous sess for x minutes do these things so you pick 10 that are important to you right be able to wake wake surf is one of mine right and they run the calculations on like here's your vo2 now and here's the decline that you would have like for each client where i'm at and then the activities on one side of what you can do and it's one of the things i tried to do in the book way back when before like the technology and stuff was there is kind of like how many watt hour how many watt hours per kilogram of energy do i need to climb a flight of stairs to do x activity etc and here it's basically vo2 max is kind of like the best indicator and and the things i the things i want to do in my last decade of life like 80 of them i cannot do at this current trajectory so you're saying that bad like now but i'm kind of fucking future bill over and i don't want to do that i don't want to fuck future bill over that much so you really have to think about that like this whole book is like think about the total arc of your life and your total fulfillment and and the net present value of that and i'm completely fucking over future bill right well this is
Speaker 3actually interesting because most people are probably fucking over their future self you just said you're you're you're screwed
Speaker 1it up what are you going to do to change i've taken some of the capital and you know we just hired another trainer that that's here that can work you know come with that person or another person to be like travel with me too because i travel so much and that's always an excuse and it's like well if i have somebody who just travels with me in their trainer then i don't you know what i mean i got somebody to like keep that motivation and accountability like if i can't be accountable i need to outsource accountability but i need to do whatever i can in my power to make sure that i don't go over future
Speaker 2bill you have a you know you wrote the book and the best book titles ever and i've studied this it's almost too good you don't even need to read it yeah exactly you can give somebody the book cover and they can they should judge it by its cover so the book is called die with zero what was the original title gonna be and how did you what would you wake up one day and have that did you do you hire somebody to come up with that line like where did that come
Speaker 1from no we we it was just like we came up with like 10 or 20 titles like what is this book gonna be you know die with nothing maximize your life like kind of like descriptions of the book and the ultimate concept is is that like you use all your resources here on this vacation on planet earth you leave it all on the field right so you die you know and and people are attached to the money aspect of it so die with zero just hit it's like there it is and it's also die with zero regrets right like it's like if you if you leave everything that if you do your best and you leave everything on the field you have zero regrets like most of people say do you have regrets i go yeah and all my regrets are a version of when i didn't do my best so whether i lost my temper or i did this or i behaved this way or was it you know i was fat and out of shape it's like i didn't do my best and therefore i have regrets when i do my best that's all i can do there's no regrets it's unfortunate like unfortunate things still happen but i don't regret that like i don't regret my ass you know what i'm accountable for and then the the publishers love this like you know they were a little there's a little bit worried about like well people getting on airport riding to an airport you know and it's there it's like die you know you know like that's going to be hard sale in an airport but it was like it just hit and says like it was provocative and we went with it
Speaker 3i've used your book um it's changed two parts of my life the first is now when i take vacations the way that we roll is we get a big house and for those who can afford it we say um here's the dates that we are going everyone's welcome come come and do vacation with us uh like to our to like my parents or my in-laws right and it's pretty awesome it's made vacation so fun and then the second thing is i have um in-laws who created a business and they're very successful and one day they're having a conversation they're like look when we die here's what we want to leave everyone and i was like look here's what i think you should do you're not asking for advice it's your money do what you want but you should do one of these three things the first thing that you should do give it to us now don't need any money so that's probably the least good one but if you do want to give us money give it to me right now but don't do that one probably the second thing is um go and do something for yourself be selfish whatever you want to do that makes you happy just go and spend all the money on yourself or the third thing go and do something that we could all enjoy together you guys have been talking about getting this bigger vacation home don't even think twice get it and we will all enjoy it with you or if you want to go on this awesome vacation let pay for all of us we'll go we'll go with you and um that's it they're starting to do it and it's made life so much more fun and so they actually got a new vacation house that like it's kind of like vacation homes are like definitely a hack for like really wealthy people because if you get a place that's big enough for everyone to be really comfortable you 100 spend more time with your family that's what i've noticed about uh about that but it's and it's changed everything for
Speaker 1us yeah like you they're now because i had this conversation with you they're gonna have a more fulfilling life and they're not gonna be like 85 on their deathbed going like why didn't i do this or i didn't get as much time with so-and-so during this time period etc like you've completely eliminated that future
Speaker 3regret and it still exists by the way like there's still fear like everyone particularly if you're like retired you're like will i have enough to take care of myself that that still exists but i do think like having a large dose of enjoy it now is
Speaker 1good yeah i mean what fear should be greater having a little bit of money and you know eating beans or wasting your entire life and missing out on your own life you know so i i think you know for me it's it's it's it's the letter you must
Speaker 2get stories like this all the time somebody reads the book and they make a change and uh yeah that's obviously got to be fulfilling what are some of the stories that stand out to you or what's a pattern you've heard from a lot of people who've read the book like a like kind of like what sam's saying you know a change a decision what comes
Speaker 1to mind is a lot of like the inheritance one because everybody's kind of like that just it makes no f**king sense it's so obvious and then they read in the book you're like you're right this is so f**king obvious like why am i waiting to die to give somebody their inheritance like an inheritance shouldn't be a bequest they're not kids they're 60 etc so that's like most of like the older cohort like that that have discretionary income or they plan on leaving something behind they've somehow changed their estate planning and they're actually taking estate planning seriously other than oh when i die what am i going to do with my whatever's left over is going to go to this person this person this person the second one is is like we've completely you know people shifted retirement dates they've completely rethought what they should be doing in the time bucket that they're having or they've done it for their parents they're like i've made my parents retire and their sole job is to hang out with their grandparents like i've had that like that's it like your job is now to hang out with the grant i'm sorry with the grandchildren and and and and just spend time with them and be around right or i've done this or you know what i mean these things i was putting off or you know just kind of woke up to what i wanted and then they they're now doing that what about people
Speaker 3who don't have money have you had what are some interesting examples of people who you learn who have read your book who were just who are retired teachers or are teachers you know um not wealthy people oh they they have
Speaker 1money um there's somebody in the military reached out and it's like yeah it doesn't make sense i have a guaranteed pension until i die why am i saving up all this money like they have no risk right like they're they're a military pension right they have no risk right like so they're like what is this lump of cash doing there right when i know i'm gonna get x per per month like they they started going to live life uh the other people don't have money is like they're making different decisions right because really it's about how do you allocate your time right it's really about choices right money is just one of the tools you have in your toolbox your health and your time right and so like they're making different decisions on how they spend time and who they're spending it with you know that costs no money right making a decision to go see your mother or go play cards with the boys right or play basketball with the boys or watch tv right neither decision requires much money or money at all right it's but how do i allocate my time in this time period where does my time belong right some of the people like yeah i'm now driving my kids to school and not complaining about it or i'm reading them books more or etc right it wasn't a money decision it was a how do i allocate my time decision and then i get some of them was like the health part really hit me the idea that i won't be able to do certain things in the future people like i'm getting in better shape right so there's there's things like that so people look at the three variables and they look at kind of like which one which tool am i not using properly a lot of people most of it by and large focuses on the money either earning it right like i'm spending you know there's the other side i'm spending too much and i'm screwing over my future self right there are things that should be delayed right but you know somebody has something to optimize to get a more fulfilling life amongst those three tools their wealth their health and their
Speaker 2time by far my favorite story in the book is at the beginning it's uh the story of when you were you're working somewhere in your 20s so you didn't have a ton of money at the time you had a job yeah it's my least favorite story and he you know he goes and you're like dude i can't just we you know how are we gonna get six weeks off he's like we're not we're gonna quit and we're gonna go and we'll try to get a job when we get back and you did what you thought was the responsible thing he seemed reckless you seemed responsible for not going yeah and you know you're like as soon as he got back i could see the glow in this mother's face and i knew i did it wrong like he he had made the correct decision and he
Speaker 1got his job was waiting for him we were f***ing peons i mean like what what were we doing what did we have to lose and then you said you
Speaker 2you finally went in your 30s and you're like you know what's not cool staying in hostels when you're 33 backpacking through your by yourself because your friends aren't going with you sleeping on
Speaker 1trains you know yeah you're a millionaire but i'm sleeping on trains and going it just didn't happen i was too bougie you know there there's not just the physical aspect of it it's just the aptitude you know like like like like kind of like your your personal you know like glow sticks and raving in clubs used to be fun you know it's not as fun anymore i mean like when i was in my
Speaker 3early 20s i used to call myself a 50 000 millionaire because i would host these conferences and i would make 50 or 100 grand or something and then i would go and ride my motorcycle across the country or do some type of trip for like six or eight weeks and it literally costs like i think i paid eighteen hundred dollars for a six-week trip to ride my motorcycle i stayed i used couchsurfing.com um so i like which was fun right it was like fun to sleep on someone's couch and like get to know them and it was the most fun that i ever had and i look back at that and i was like i'm so grateful that i was kind of silly at that era and was willing to do that and it was so much fun and it kind of creates this like rite of passage uh a little bit when you do travel like that when you're young and you are reckless and it was so much uh it was so impactful for my life and i would never do that now not i would like it was too grimy i don't want to do that shit it wouldn't
Speaker 1be i'm so envious of his story i'm like so f***ing envious i'm like god damn it i want his life you know what i mean like dude i get envious of my younger life at times and
Speaker 3what's interesting is i don't want that i don't if you offer that i could go do that now i don't want to do that but it was fun to want that then and to be able to do it yeah that's a that's a
Speaker 1great example of time bucketing like that experience belonged in that time period and doesn't transfer well to the next one even though you can still do it you just don't you don't want to i don't want to yeah so
Speaker 2have you completely slayed the money monster like do you do you wake up and do you like do you have businesses are you like investing are you trying to do
Speaker 1business i still work it's not it's not that you can't work or you can't enjoy solving the puzzle we get addicted to puzzles and those puzzles become fun to us it's just that you know using your resources during the you know i use the resource right like there's no amount of capital i can't convert into fulfillment for me what
Speaker 2do you do now for work
Speaker 1um so i have two startups one's called sky five one's called sim max there one's a geospatial uh intelligence platform kind of like uber for satellites like you can order on your phone a satellite image and i have an intelligence firm called sim max and i still trade i run the hedge fund but um i make sure that in period the things i really want out of life right that there's value into doing that and so if if i was if i if i was sitting here and i go you know to the day i die i'm not going to spend the money i have like i had no need for any other money there's no additional fulfillment to the to a marginal dollar quit it all in a heartbeat right just stop like what are you doing you know but there is marginal utility for me for some people who their concept doesn't enough they hit it like playing checkers with my friends i grow potatoes in my yard i you know i go to school whatever you know i do whatever like for them it's a different decision right like it's like no i'm wasting what
Speaker 2is it for you because you said ultimately i want to be a farmer so that doesn't cost that much
Speaker 1right uh so my farming years are really you know i know i'm going to be spending a lot less money in years but like if i keep my vo2 here and higher as i should you know there's a lot of other activities and things i would like to do i really fell in love with yachting uh they're very i do like private travel it's a time saver and the party actually starts when you get on the plane as opposed to when you get to the destination so i do i do think it's worth working for that but it at a certain time i'm almost getting close to the age where it's not really worth working for it it's not worth giving up current hours of bill and other activities for future bill to have this thing you know what i mean and so i'm constantly measuring that and you know it's also probabilistic i could lose money i could make a bunch of money
Speaker 3etc dude every every man it's like they think of either world war ii or the roman empire and they think of retiring on land and being a farmer i uh i i i did that once i tried it it wasn't for me not at that not in that time bucket so yeah but what um what's walk walk me through this vision what are you gonna do uh you're talking about later later in life yeah i
Speaker 1just yeah what's this farm
Speaker 3vision
Speaker 1i just want to have like a hobby not like a big giant farm with a tractor right how many acres like a couple acres some gardens maybe grow some tomatoes or whatever you'd be surprised that's like a garden it's like a large it's a large it's a large garden a large garden you
Speaker 3live in texas ranches are pretty big i had 20 acres i had 20 acres and the texans called it a ranchette yeah that's a ranchette you need like a thousand acres to like i got a ranch you know
Speaker 1yeah
Speaker 3i thought i was gonna
Speaker 1be cool and they were like sick yard no no no i want like basically a large garden a big gardener some bees you know i had bees yeah you got the bees you had the whole
Speaker 3thing right like yeah i had bees i had honey it was great bee beekeeping is probably the only ranch adjacent activity that is not a lot of work and is worth it
Speaker 1yeah and i love the pollinator so that would be great um you know just kind of enjoying grandchildren and friends and visiting and like you know when you're younger you're like oh my god i'm gonna be like oh my god i'm gonna be you're seeking adventure right you're looking to create a story right like you're looking to create stories and memories and when you're older you have stories looking for friends to talk about them right and so when you're older when my you know my knees have finally gone i guess there's knee replacement surgery but my back and i'm tired and my mental acuity's on on the decline in lung capacity is on decline you know the things that i will do because they you know it's difficult to walk four miles or it's difficult to whatever my world is going to shrink uh and i'm going to be looking for friends to tell stories and i want to have a bunch of stories to retire you know retire my memories and do the simple things enjoy the simple pleasures of life
Speaker 3so a lot of times people at the podcast they'll reach out to me and they're wondering hey sam and sean how do you meet all these amazing entrepreneurs how do you find all these stories well i have a hack you see i actually have a community called hampton it's a community for entrepreneurs doing at least three million revenue although we do on average something like five million dollars a year in revenue we have the founders of doordash a figure of blue chew all these amazing companies are part of hampton and what's interesting is because of the environment in hampton which frankly is very similar to my first million we have a very unique high trust environment when people apply and go through the vetting process they're put in groups of like eight or nine other entrepreneurs and they get real about everything that's going on in their life and in their business it's sort of like when people listen to mfm they get inspired to come up with new solutions for business that's what happens in real life in hampton it's life-changing and i'm really happy to be a part of this and i'm excited to be part of this and i'm excited to be a part of this it's life-changing and so if you're a founder of a startup that does at least three million in revenue and you just want to go ahead and pull forward five or ten years worth of success then check it out the url is joinhampton.com again the url joinhampton.com when was the last time you worked from an office and has that impacted
Speaker 1your life i have offices uh you know but i i don't go into office i mean i have this like kind of like like an ankle monitor called a cell phone that allows me to trade from anywhere but it's not going to work for me so i'm going to go into office it's always with me so i can trade and do work from anywhere and so it's like you know it's like i am tethered to the work world but it does make for great office spaces right like when i'm on a boat on vacation my office is the boat on vacation wherever i am that's the office right so it's both a blessing and a curse because i it extends the amount of neurons that i apply to these puzzles these work puzzles and i'm not going to be able to do it all the time i'm going to be able to do it all the time i'm not so sure if that's a good thing or bad thing i'm constantly evaluating it given how old i am sean do you miss having
Speaker 3an office because sean is the same thing sean diego comes and works from your house
Speaker 2not at all i do like uh i did have a commute at one point where i was biking and walking to work i think that's the only part i miss is like the habit of getting up in the morning and getting outside and and walking or biking but now i just do that with my kids school drop off that scratches that itch for me i never I never wanted to go to an office again. having a dope home office and I have one or two people that will come over and work from here and then and then they get out of here halfway through the day and then I'm just back at home you know I'm not looking to go into an office you love that Sam you you love going into an office
Speaker 3I do I do like it so I go to my office three days a week I'm at my office here and uh I I live in Manhattan and so it's nice to have the separation because like we don't have like Texas size houses here but like I there is something that I like about getting dressed up and like I like laying out my work clothes the night before I kind of like that routine I know it sounds like my daughter loved that too dude I'm kind of a square in that regard I I like the routine of like getting here and going home there's something about it that I enjoy but I do find myself significantly more productive at home yeah
Speaker 1I mean you know when I talk to people about like offices are going with it you know when we deconstruct it it's like well I like the people and I like spending time with people and a lot of people are like I like the people and I like the people and I like the people and I like you know the walk here or whatever and I'm like you can do that without having the office you can actually take those people out to dinner and spend more quality time as opposed to right next to them while they're doing this and you're doing this you can actually just take a walk to Central Park and back and forth and make that part of your routine you know you can actually have them have a walking working thing and walk around the track and work with the phones and devices you can reconstruct it and it might be better but some people you know whatever whatever your value systems are you I think it's better
Speaker 3for young people though and so one of the reasons my company we have an office is I remember I was talking we were one of our employees was in Manhattan and I was zooming her when she was in her shitty apartment and I'm like this is a horrible existence are you miserable she goes I hate this I was like we got to get an office like this it was it's not particularly fun I think for a 22 year old to be working from home I think it's a lot more fun when you have children or when you're
Speaker 1the boss yes I would agree that like I think we need to help the younger generation connect with other humans because we need to help the younger generation connect with other humans because there's so many devices that are actually disconnecting them from other humans it's the illusion of connection with social media the in-person mixing and hanging out and discussions and meeting that art is being lost amongst younger generations so I do I am a proponent of that Sean
Speaker 3did you see this story about this painting that he just bought it was it was they did a good job of I think it was on The Wall Street Journal covered this painting bill that you got I think it's called sugar Shack have you seen this Sean I think it was on The Wall Street Journal covered this painting bill that you got I think it was called Sugar Shack have you seen this Sean
Speaker 1I
Speaker 2saw this a long time ago as a YouTube video right you spent some ungodly amount of money on this painting
Speaker 1what's the story I mean it's a it's a very unique piece in American art particularly because one you know you say like well who was the African American Da Vinci or whatever and the answer is no one because they were slaves and so it wasn't until after slavery and the formation of families and they started growing up where people can actually afford paintbrushes and have the time to actually paint and so you kind of get like your first generation of like masters African American masters and the narratives that they would paint about born in like the 40s or 50s or second generation depending on what you use is like 1910 1920s and then the 40s and so this artist was a football player was an artist and an athlete's body and started painting and he was painting in this particular painting was about Sugar Shack which he had passed growing up in the south it's like a party house about black joy in the south during segregation which is a uniquely American theme right like you can still live ice ice rink or whatever but it's uniquely American and not not necessarily from like oh my gosh slavery is bad or segregation was bad but just like you're just not gonna get that narrative right it's like jazz is the the only original American art form like this painting is very very unique culturally by like the first or second generation masters and it was featured on Marvin Marvin Gaye's album that won a Grammy and it was on the opening or outro of good times which Norman Lear was like kind of the first producer to put stories of young black families on TV back in the 70s and so this is very culturally relevant very historically significant a narrative that's not going to be painted in China or anywhere else etc so it's uniquely American and and I was in love with it I had seen it since I was a kid and any black person in my age range knows about this painting has seen this painting and other works by Barnes and when it came up John Arnold messaged me sent me an email goes hey isn't this the painting you've been looking for okay I've been looking for because there's two copies of it one it was painted it was in the back of the artist car Marvin Gaye sees the painting freaks out he's like can I have this I must have this for my album and when the biggest music star of the time asks you for a painting and you're a struggling artist you do what he says so he changed the painting and painted on you know Marvin Gaye's thing and it's on it's on I think his album called after the dance but that wasn't what it wasn't about that right so he went and made another copy of it okay he painted another exact copy of it for what the painting was really about and so I tried to buy that piece from Eddie Murphy and basically got crickets you know like wouldn't respond and then I John called me goes this is up and I almost cried when I heard about it and I was like okay I'm not going to telephone auction this thing because what if the telephone goes down like I had all this nervous I'm going to fly there's a first live auction I've been to and I flow to Sotheby's and I stole that painting you know so like a lot of people focus on the price and there's like oh you paid this much there was a one of four works that went for a hundred million dollars what did you pay I don't know what you paid the total price of 15 million describe the auction battle it was it was chaos because they did some chicanery so there's an evening auction and a day auction and the evening auction is particularly the more expensive works right but this this had an estimate that did not fit the evening auction right like an estimate of 252 it's like it was in a hundreds of thousand top million right like a million and I was just like you know people were like what why the is this in the evening auction but so I knew there were some players who wanted to got this thing but I figured like okay oh there's a bit of three million take it scare everybody off and walk out the building with this with this painting and it just like was chaos like seven like everything was pretty standard like you know you know whatever it was Andy Warhol pin what I was just do I have a bit here to have a bit this was like a trading pit it was like trading places for the first five minutes so then you can hear me yelling out two million and then two million three three four and it just goes crazy until we get to like around seven million and it's like three people then two people and then it's just I and this other bitter going back and forth on this painting you could see them right you're you're there live they're there
Speaker 2live you know the guy who was bidding
Speaker 1against me was like two seats ahead of me was empty row and he was right there and it was just he and I going back and forth and me pausing and me thinking like what is going on here like who was he I don't know he was he was an art consultant a very respectable art consultant working for somebody who never revealed to the buyer was the only thing that was odd aside from me you know I told is that touring the middle of bidding which you know it is don't talk you don't talk to each other whatever he turns around to me goes I I'm not going to stop and then I said to him well then I'm going to make you pay and then you know people kind of like chuckled who heard all that laughed and then it kept going and you know during the during the before the auction started I told my wife I said listen babe don't worry about me if I faint or anything just keep bidding and it's a true story I said do not and there was like a painting that went before and I was like I should I should this is really a good painting I should buy this I was like no you need to save your money just in case thank God because I I was way over the amount I was willing to pay for this before the auction started going going what did
Speaker 2you think your what did you think
Speaker 1your backs was I thought I
Speaker 2was going to pay like
Speaker 1three to five
Speaker 3million dollars you know and it was what you said 15 15 at the
Speaker 1end did you were
Speaker 2at the end were you wobbled were you were you shook a little bit I was I was I was in I was in
Speaker 1my eyes were watering I was I was so happy and I was just do you feel what
Speaker 3what do you feel like you feel like a historian or something like you're like like you're the steward of history like what what why would did this is it so important
Speaker 1that you have yeah I mean like the role of the collector is to signal to future generations what is worth preserving so what you see in museums etc were the commissions of wealthy people back in the day or things that they collected you you may not be seeing the best art actually statistically speaking you probably are not seeing the best art right like some of it was probably burned or it was in people's houses or whatever and didn't make it or didn't show what you're seeing is is what prior people had signaled to future generations what was worth preserving and so given that context of this piece and and in the historical context I gave you of like American art particularly African American art there was just an arbitrage going on because of the perception right there's a lot of people that are like oh black guy should own and I'm like no black guy should own it the world should own it a Russian billionaire should own it But we get to steal this because people have these you know historical racism in the art community where museums would not collect the african american art and they would not put it in or not have and then now kind of that makeup here that kind of like social stigma of of you know who should own this art whatever it's it's stuck in even the black community i'm like you guys are idiots like it's creating an arbitrage between the valuable things that should be signaled and preserved for future generations and what the market is paying so i was ecstatic i felt like uh you know i arbitrage the market i i i like i had made it i had finally made it that i can actually own this painting that i used to watch on tv all the time so it was i was super happy that's so awesome it's
Speaker 3it's also awesome to like i think it's cool to be like this kind of like man's man and also like be into some of the other shit it's like this it's a very eclectic person did you guys see that story about uh sylvester salone apparently in the 80s he'd bought this um uh a monet i think it was called haystacks i think he bought it for um 110 000 in the 1980s years later he had some bills to pay or something like that and he sold it for three million and then like five or ten years later that same painting sold for 130 million dollars yeah yeah and he was telling this story and he was like i was so foolish to sell he's like because art it doesn't require upkeep like i don't have to like move it or fix it or repair it he's like i don't have to i was foolish why did i why did i sell this and it was a really cool story to see but but also it's like sylvester salone you know he's supposed to be this like guy's guy yet he writes this badass movie by himself so he clearly has an artistic side and he spots a monet but before the world does and it's just kind of cool to see like an
Speaker 1eclectic human being oh you should um you should watch the uh there's an interview with him about rocky and the characters and him writing the characters he is an artist he wrote that and it's like uh when he talks about the development of the characters and what it's about it's it's it's an amazing thing like the sequel is all about the boxing and clever lang and whatever but like and he became an action star but like he's an artist like people are multi-faceted so you know you look at like the highlight of my life on instagram or you look at whatever and you might like have an idea or a good view into a certain facets of people's lives but like everybody's a multi-cut diamond uh and and some of those facets that you don't see are actually a bigger part of their lives in a
Speaker 2strange way by having that bidding war telling this story getting the buying it at the price you did you increase the value of the art right so it's like it's kind of reflexive in that way where the art actually increases in value because you paid more and because of the way it went down in a strange way
Speaker 1yeah i mean i signal to the market uh barnes's works are important at least as a grade works right like every arctic has their a work their b work their d work and you know etc and so um the market got a signal and there was another piece at auction that i wanted to buy and then i couldn't afford it because you know that was a piece that had i bought that first i probably would have bought it for a couple hundred grand it went for like two million to some some asian buyers or something like that right and this was the the day auction right this is the the cheaper stuff right and so i completely reset the barnes market you know and and it wasn't me it's just the market became aware right like you know when people like well why did you pay this much and why is this significant you know i had like three uh you know art net interviews and wall street journal and interviews and i went over the thesis and everybody's like you're absolutely
Speaker 3right there's this photo of you like holding up your arms yeah yeah it's a great photo yeah i would have held up my arms when the
Speaker 2guy turned around and said i'm not gonna stop and then you had a cool thing to say back you know how hard it is to have a cool thing to say back in the moment like i would have already been celebrating the victory of how hard it is to have a cool thing to say back in the moment like i would have already been celebrating the victory of how having the cool shade the cool one liner ready to ready to lock stock and barrel right then not like 10 minutes later thinking
Speaker 1of what i should have said no i don't know it's just it just flowed you know it was it was a you know some people it's like i gotta have this car or i i made it when this this this was the thing you know and i i'd become a a peon minor art collector thief of collecting black works and my friend john arnold was helping me he's a extremely astute collector he saw first he's like would you i said what do you think he goes it's exquisite and so uh and he's the one who notified me because i was after it and and kind of guide me on like collecting like collect what you like you know collect a works etc and so anyway yeah it it does help but i don't expect to close the arbitrage clap in my lifetime i'm just you know i get to show people and carry it where's it now oh right now it's on loan in a museum i think it's in in ohio and then it's going to art basel on loan and then it's on it's on loan it's on a lot of loans like people borrow it it's on tour how does that work so they're
Speaker 2paying you to be able to exhibit it they don't pay
Speaker 1they take they pay the insurance and they carry it etc when i first got it my kids were like don't you dare bring that to the house you can't have 15 million dollars hanging on the wall we're gonna get robbed and so like they were all scared like somebody you know people know who you are and they're gonna come come take the painting so it uh so it's it's on tour right now man thank you so much
Speaker 3for coming on i you and i i don't know if you know this we've been trading dms back and forth like four years now trying to get you on uh you know we uh we've have all types of amazing people come on i think that you're um and not we don't look up to everyone we like most of them we don't look up to everyone but i think you're one of the handful that we uh you really have some parts of your life that we really really really admire and um you know we ask ourselves like uh like this this flavor of advice what would they advise that we do in this period of our life and so you're definitely uh in the mix so we appreciate you
Speaker 1yeah i tell people i'm not a role model but i can be an inspiration you don't want to live my life i make way too many mistakes but you can you know the words are pure right like a lot of like and i i don't i don't want to be famous or too famous you don't want to be too famous because you can't get naked at a party and you know without you being in the paper i always tell people and i reserve the right to get naked at a party it's kind of my line um and and you also then become in service of this persona right like if you become that guy and the words are pure right the words in the book appear the stories appear like the concepts appear i am but you're kind of gotten
Speaker 3famous you're you're you're sort of famous right now like z level z
Speaker 1level is okay popular yeah z level is okay you know what i mean you don't want to be like you can't enjoy life you can't go walking wait were you popular before you had the book yeah for different reasons i was trying to poker poker i was running around a hedonist life when i got divorced i was running around girls and i was like gonna i was gonna go climb the fame game right and i was like you were like a damn blazerian guy weren't you yeah i was like a i was like i'm not a damn blazerian guy he's a different guy but like yeah i was in this whole like i'm just gonna date a bunch of people i'm gonna have like kind of this movable feast of a life you know like the sun also rises hemingway type life you know what i mean traveling around living this life and i saw the value and fame was like this was great marketing like you can get a lot of girls you know uh being famous and then i saw that it robs you of your life fame shrinks your world and you go into a bubble you can't you can't walk around you can't do things you can't whatever and i saw that with michael phelps and i saw that with dan uh we would go places like okay we're in capri we're gonna go out and walk these shops or whatever and they can't go because of all the you know dan dan dan you know all those type of things and i thought oh that's hell you can't walk around you can't do anything you can't do anything you can't do anything you can't that would be hell for me because i like traveling and i like exploring new cultures and i'm meeting new people and if i have this fame persona that like one can't do it without security people constantly interrupt you and two you play up to that you become a slave to that persona right if your persona is i'm the nice guy then you're always playing the nice guy even when you don't want to be nice or you need to be forceful or assertive right not even a dick but just assertive right or if you're always a calm guy you have to always play that aggressive or if you build your aggressive action star you're always playing a role of like i'm the rock can you smell what i'm cooking when you might be into like lilies and bee farming you know you have to play up to it and so i care about being able to have the most fulfilling life and so that's why you never want to be that famous you're gonna write another one my wife says hell no uh it takes a lot of time but i actually um i'm being i'm it is seductive um you guys know tim urban of course and so like he's like we should write a book together we like we have a bunch of ideas and write a book together that's a crazy combo he just goes that would be fun he goes yeah so we've i've been like yeah i just need to kill a couple projects so i can have the time what topic right now i have a no new project staying for my wife and she's right like she's helping me be accountable to have the most fulfilling life but like if i i do i do this is seductive to me what what topic don't know yet we've been thinking about a couple
Speaker 3what what's what's what's what's what are you obsessed
Speaker 1with well there was there's a lot of things on like um relationships and purpose you know the one thing about the book i don't tell people is like whether whether their values you know like you you choose your values right and what what is fulfilling and and and so i have a couple theories about purpose and fulfillment like i think there's a lot of purpose porn out there i think it's complete bullshit i think the purpose of life is to be happy uh and purpose comes in design and there's a lot of design cues from your your biology that tell you your purpose the same design cues and pair of scissors that tell you it's for cutting right and so i think um i'm I have some theories about that. I won't go into the long story about it. There's a couple of things. Relationships, like a lot of people wanted the cookbook version of this book. They're like, great, I get the high level concepts. Tell me what to do, you know? I don't think I want to do that, but, you know, I can mix in some of that.
Speaker 3Well, a lot of the books now are having like handbooks, which I actually think, I think those are cool. Like I know that there's Design Your Life, which was that Stanford course. They had like a handbook. I did that like 10 years ago. It's awesome. Nobody does the handbook stuff. Dude, it was great. You
Speaker 1buy it though. Nobody does them. You can give
Speaker 3it to them. Nobody's going to fill it in.
Speaker 1Yeah, it's tough. I left it for other people to write the computer programs, to write the handbooks, to actually do the math, you know, to have, you know, I want them to be in my church and go build it. I kind of wanted to be like Jesus and just like, you know, go forth and build a church. I'm out of here. That type of thing, you know? Like I don't want to be the guy, you know? A lot of people write books. I don't want to write books to be the guy.
Speaker 2You don't want to be Jesus, but I don't want to be the guy. I mean, I was the guy. I just want to be the guy.
Speaker 1Yeah, well, Jesus got nailed to a cross, my friend. Like there's a price to pay. Exactly. I get nailed to the fame cross, right? Like a lot of people like write books and it's like they have the chorus and the podcast and the thing. As a matter of fact, there's a guy coming out named Austin who is like the number one fan, my number one fan of the book, gives out the book all the time, spoke at like conferences about my book. And he's like, hey, can I do a Die With Zero podcast? I'm like, have at it, have fun. I'll do one show, but I don't want to be the guy, right? Like I wrote the book to like have a fulfilling life, not to get famous. Well, we appreciate you doing this. You're the man. All right. Appreciate it, guys.
Speaker 3Thanks for having me. All right. That's it. That's the pod. I feel like I can rule the world. I know I could be what I want to. I put my all in it like no day is off. On the road, let's travel, never looking back. All right, my friends. I have a new podcast for you guys to check out. It's called Content is Profit. And it's hosted by Luis and Fonzie Cameo. After years of building content teams and frameworks for companies like Red Bull and Orange Theory Fitness, Luis and Fonzie are on a mission to bridge the gap between content and revenue. In each episode, you're going to hear from top entrepreneurs and creators, and you're going to hear them share their secrets and strategies to turn their content into profit. So you can check out Content is Profit wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you.
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